Life seems to be passing me by at an alarming rate and I feel like I constantly want to just stop everything so I can savour the moment. My daughters are growing in leaps and bounds and each one has developed their own unique personality. We are fortunate to have moved to the coast and they are loving their new surroundings and thoroughly enjoying the impulsive trips to the beach with their friends. These trips now take ten minutes instead of the ten hours it used to take for a week at the beach.
But my reason for writing tonight is the constant worry that all us moms seem to face these days. Our kids are firstly struggling with sensory issues, leaning difficulties, inability to entertain themselves and my two pet peeves, a sense of entitlement and instant gratification. What is going on? Whats happening to our kids today? Why don't they listen? Why do they whine and want to sit watching TV all day? Why do they have no respect for their parents or older people anymore and why has every day become a constant battlefield of emotions and hurt feelings??
I have been reading many articles and blogs from around the world and children the world over seem to all have the same problems and all parents from around the globe seem to be suffering the same feelings of why???
From the moment we conceive we are bombarded with whats best for our babies. From the magazine article to the blog post to the baby clinic at the hospital. Everyone seems to know what is best and if you are anything like me I read everything I could get my hands on to prepare for my baby. But funnily enough nobody really asked me what I would think is best and how do I think my baby should be raised? Be it from the way they are born to whether you will be breast feeding or bottle feeding. Society seems to have deemed us moms unfit to make these decisions for ourselves. Normal birth? Good heavens no, you are to small, too big, too scared etc etc.... C-section? Well maybe that will be easier for you/baby/hubby/relatives etc etc... Rooming in with baby? Are you sure you are not too tired, too sore, too scared to have baby with you all night long? Breastfeeding? Good heavens are you sure? You seem awfully small, tired, upset, and are you sure you have enough milk? Bottle feeding? What on earth? Are you sure? And so the list goes on. That's just before you have left the hospital.
Ultimately we manage to get home and take care of our babies amidst a lot of well meaning advice but we learn over time that we do know what is best and we get past the baby stage and onto the toddler stage and then we hit the preschool years and its then that all hell breaks loose.
So what is the problem with our children? Is it us? Is it society? I think its a lot of things. Its the food we eat, the lack of sleep, the lack of routines. the lack of free play and movement, the lack of parents being around and the lack of discipline. And by discipline I mean that children don't seem to be taught right from wrong anymore because we all have rights. So now if I open my mouth to critisize anyone it is my right to do so because hey, we have freedom of speech. But what happened to only opening your mouth if you have something nice to say? So our kids learn that its okay to just say whatever you like to whomever you want. Our kids are growing up expecting things to just fall into their laps. They have this sense of entitlement and I think we are fueling this fire because we feel sorry for our kids. We don't want them to suffer or have any hardships and society is making us feel like we need to protect their feelings all the time. We are raising a soft generation who cannot think for themselves and expect everything to be handed to them on a silver platter.
Can we fix this? And if so how? How do we raise good, kind and strong adults? How do we make sure that the next generation will be able to survive the hardships that life invariably throws at you? How do we make sure that the next generation can cope?
I am sure everyone has their opinions and a lot will be based on studies and facts. Mine is that we need to start treating our kids like kids instead of adults, we need to teach them that your elders are to be respected, we need to teach them that nothing just falls into your lap without hard work and mostly we need to teach them delayed gratification. Teach them the value of building something and the pleasure gleaned from seeing the finished product. Teach them that we cannot just want something and have it delivered to you. Teach them the value of money but not let it rule them or dictate how you treat people. Teach them the value of helping those in need and doing things for others. Teach them that childhood is for being a child, learning new things and running free. Teach them responsibility and that actions have consequences. Teach them to want to learn new things, to discover things for themselves and use those discoveries to grow into the adults the world needs. And to do this we need to stop handling them with kid gloves and feeling guilty every time we say no and they react with tears or long faces and bratty behaviour. Get them off the chairs in front of the TV and into the kitchen helping mom, into the garden helping dad and for heavens sake into the sunshine where a scraped knee is something to be proud of and not an excuse to go back in front of the TV. Get these kids moving. Modern day school is unfortunately also fueling this lack of movement as the kids spend more time chained to a desk than they do moving. As far as I am concerned there are too many labels being used to describe natural reactions to being forced to sit and concentrate for longer than kids are able and the less they move, the less their neurons work and the less they learn. (More on this here www.ilt.co.za) Fidgeting and not being able to sit still is a direct consequence of children trying to fire up their neurons on a subconscious level. I fear if we do not do something soon we will have a lost generation who will never be able to think for themselves let alone bring up the generation after them to do so....
But my reason for writing tonight is the constant worry that all us moms seem to face these days. Our kids are firstly struggling with sensory issues, leaning difficulties, inability to entertain themselves and my two pet peeves, a sense of entitlement and instant gratification. What is going on? Whats happening to our kids today? Why don't they listen? Why do they whine and want to sit watching TV all day? Why do they have no respect for their parents or older people anymore and why has every day become a constant battlefield of emotions and hurt feelings??
I have been reading many articles and blogs from around the world and children the world over seem to all have the same problems and all parents from around the globe seem to be suffering the same feelings of why???
From the moment we conceive we are bombarded with whats best for our babies. From the magazine article to the blog post to the baby clinic at the hospital. Everyone seems to know what is best and if you are anything like me I read everything I could get my hands on to prepare for my baby. But funnily enough nobody really asked me what I would think is best and how do I think my baby should be raised? Be it from the way they are born to whether you will be breast feeding or bottle feeding. Society seems to have deemed us moms unfit to make these decisions for ourselves. Normal birth? Good heavens no, you are to small, too big, too scared etc etc.... C-section? Well maybe that will be easier for you/baby/hubby/relatives etc etc... Rooming in with baby? Are you sure you are not too tired, too sore, too scared to have baby with you all night long? Breastfeeding? Good heavens are you sure? You seem awfully small, tired, upset, and are you sure you have enough milk? Bottle feeding? What on earth? Are you sure? And so the list goes on. That's just before you have left the hospital.
Ultimately we manage to get home and take care of our babies amidst a lot of well meaning advice but we learn over time that we do know what is best and we get past the baby stage and onto the toddler stage and then we hit the preschool years and its then that all hell breaks loose.
So what is the problem with our children? Is it us? Is it society? I think its a lot of things. Its the food we eat, the lack of sleep, the lack of routines. the lack of free play and movement, the lack of parents being around and the lack of discipline. And by discipline I mean that children don't seem to be taught right from wrong anymore because we all have rights. So now if I open my mouth to critisize anyone it is my right to do so because hey, we have freedom of speech. But what happened to only opening your mouth if you have something nice to say? So our kids learn that its okay to just say whatever you like to whomever you want. Our kids are growing up expecting things to just fall into their laps. They have this sense of entitlement and I think we are fueling this fire because we feel sorry for our kids. We don't want them to suffer or have any hardships and society is making us feel like we need to protect their feelings all the time. We are raising a soft generation who cannot think for themselves and expect everything to be handed to them on a silver platter.
Can we fix this? And if so how? How do we raise good, kind and strong adults? How do we make sure that the next generation will be able to survive the hardships that life invariably throws at you? How do we make sure that the next generation can cope?
I am sure everyone has their opinions and a lot will be based on studies and facts. Mine is that we need to start treating our kids like kids instead of adults, we need to teach them that your elders are to be respected, we need to teach them that nothing just falls into your lap without hard work and mostly we need to teach them delayed gratification. Teach them the value of building something and the pleasure gleaned from seeing the finished product. Teach them that we cannot just want something and have it delivered to you. Teach them the value of money but not let it rule them or dictate how you treat people. Teach them the value of helping those in need and doing things for others. Teach them that childhood is for being a child, learning new things and running free. Teach them responsibility and that actions have consequences. Teach them to want to learn new things, to discover things for themselves and use those discoveries to grow into the adults the world needs. And to do this we need to stop handling them with kid gloves and feeling guilty every time we say no and they react with tears or long faces and bratty behaviour. Get them off the chairs in front of the TV and into the kitchen helping mom, into the garden helping dad and for heavens sake into the sunshine where a scraped knee is something to be proud of and not an excuse to go back in front of the TV. Get these kids moving. Modern day school is unfortunately also fueling this lack of movement as the kids spend more time chained to a desk than they do moving. As far as I am concerned there are too many labels being used to describe natural reactions to being forced to sit and concentrate for longer than kids are able and the less they move, the less their neurons work and the less they learn. (More on this here www.ilt.co.za) Fidgeting and not being able to sit still is a direct consequence of children trying to fire up their neurons on a subconscious level. I fear if we do not do something soon we will have a lost generation who will never be able to think for themselves let alone bring up the generation after them to do so....
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